


We All Stand Upon the Shoulders of Those Before Us

by duckiesinaline



Series: Cup Runneth Over [2]
Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Man Out of Time, Original Character(s), but he's had a lot of practice at this, this may be leading somewhere
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-08
Updated: 2017-09-08
Packaged: 2018-12-25 07:56:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,243
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12031530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duckiesinaline/pseuds/duckiesinaline
Summary: The first time Graves held an electronic device in his hand, it had been either a handheld calculator or a remote. But it was probably the calculator because he clearly remembered Newt all but visibly glowing with pride as he had pushed it into Graves’ hands, ignoring his cringing protests.“It’s a calculations machine.” The crow’s feet at the corners of Newt’s eyes deepened with his grin, and though the rich, ginger sheen of his curls had faded half to gray, his gaze was as bright and clear as ever. “Except it has nothing to do with arithmancy. Except it could be? I’m not entirely sure. Alister has tried explaining it to me three separate times now, but I still only understand every other sentence.”





	We All Stand Upon the Shoulders of Those Before Us

**Author's Note:**

> Aaaaaaaaand now it's become a series.
> 
> Since these are all just snapshots, they're roughly connected but roughly disconnected. Premise if you haven't read the first story where it's all set up: Grindelwald's last gift to Percival Graves was to make him immortal. Now it's a heck of a long time later.

The first time Graves held an electronic device in his hand, it had been either a handheld calculator or a remote. But it was probably the calculator because he clearly remembered Newt all but visibly glowing with pride as he had pushed it into Graves’ hands, ignoring his cringing protests.

_“It’s a calculations machine.” The crow’s feet at the corners of Newt’s eyes deepened with his grin, and though the rich, ginger sheen of his curls had faded half to gray, his gaze was as bright and clear as ever. “Except it has nothing to do with arithmancy. Except it could be? I’m not entirely sure. Alister has tried explaining it to me three separate times now, but I still only understand every other sentence.”_

_Graves cradled the thing gingerly by the edges, though he wasn’t certain that was any better than any other grip. The neat array of identical buttons and their arcane symbology was strangely intimidating; he knew the small grid of single digits well enough, but the rest looked uncomfortably like half-finished arithmantic equations - as unstable and volatile as a half-made potion. “Your Alister? How old is he now, twenty-five? Thirty?”_

_“Thirty-six, this summer.”_

_Merlin. Thirty-six. Had it really been thirty-six years since Graves received that first photo of Alister Nimbus Scamander? The swaddled newborn had been a wrinkled, red-faced storm of disapproval in his mother’s arms, toothless mouth gaped open as wide as it could go. And even though a sweaty, tired looking Tina had been wincing away from the shrieks that the photo couldn’t audibly convey, there was no mistaking how her smile couldn’t possibly have been any wider._

_Graves gradually became all too conscious of the silence that Newt had, with a shuffle of awkward sympathy, allowed to stretch. Clearing his throat, he asked with dark suspicion, “This is his work? Did he ask you to use me as a test subject because he won’t need to pay for healing potions if this blows up in my face?”_

_Newt ducked his head, though it didn’t hide the lopsided smile that had lost its shyness and acquired a sly tilt over the years. “He promised that whatever costs such an incident would have incurred -_ if _it even occurred - would be donated to the local zoo. I gathered it was several miracles he created - maybe literally - that’s allowed him to reduce a magical power source to this size, though he says it will only last - “_

“Sir, would you like me to walk you through a tutorial?”

Graves shook himself and glanced up from the hardlight tablet that the technician had brought. Three rings sat heavy on Graves’ left thumb and first two fingers; whenever he spread them in a certain position, the screen would flash into existence. “Thank you, no. I don’t think that will be necessary.”

“Uh, yessir,” the young man said reluctantly. “That all you need, then?”

“That will be all.”

The technician nodded smartly almost before Graves had finished speaking, turning upon a heel and marching off.

“I suppose you’ve had a lot of experience in adjusting to advances in technology.” The statement was more leading than a mere comment. He could feel Titania’s gaze on him, the low murmur of the discussion she had been having with her aides now silent.

Graves opened his hand, tracing the edge of the virtual screen that appeared again with his other thumb. He could feel the haptic feedback like a constant prickle of static against his skin, unlike any other material he had ever felt before - but undeniably _there -_ before shutting it off for good. While he had never been as fascinated by such advancements as the gadget-heads and the innovators, he made a point to keep a close eye on its progress.

Some advancements were made to better lives. Others were decidedly not. Graves was ever-so-conscious, after a near-disastrous mistake long ago, that he needed to always be vigilant in educating himself on both. Sometimes, there was a distressing amount of overlap between them.

“As someone once told me - “ _Minos; Minos, Alister’s second boy,_ “ - technology may change, but the rule of rapid adoption is always the same: play with it till you break it.” He glanced up, brow arched. “Besides, I’ve found that I usually do better if I’ve had a chance to explore a bit on my own, first. There’s usually less frustration all around when my old brain doesn’t feel pressured to keep up with the young on the spot.”

Titania covered her mouth discreetly, but laughter was obvious in the squint of her eyes. “Fair enough. And should I allow you some time to explore the files a bit on your own first, then? So that you don’t feel unduly pressured to keep up with the mere fifty and sixty-year-olds during the official briefing.”

The president had an almost girlish levity that occasionally peeked through, while Seraphina’s wit had leaned toward dark, sharp-edged, and devastatingly targeted. Graves missed fencing words with her, but was beginning to feel honestly glad for the difference - it would have been disorienting and ultimately more painful if Titania had been any more similar to his old friend.

Not that the current president didn't feel the weight of all her duties; there was a furrow between her brows that looked like it was well on its way to becoming a permanent fixture. But she seemed to evince a genuine delight and almost-relief whenever she turned toward him ... as if she had finally found a support she could trust herself to lean on.

It made him nervous. Unrealistic expectations and political naivete could be as dangerous as outright malice.

And while for her, President Mallory may have been over sixty years in the past, for Graves, his sentence had been handed down to him only a scant week before.

“I’m too old to have much use for pride anymore. It would be most appreciated, Madam President,” Graves played along.

He had a lot of catching up to do.

* * *

At the beginning, Graves had tried to keep track of the ever-widening branches of the families he’d cared most about; had even managed it for a good century or two. Traced spouses and siblings, the children and grandchildren, and the ever-lengthening multiples of great-grandchildren.

Except, one day, as he eyed the forest of genealogies projected around him, a question suddenly bobbed to the surface of his mind - how did he fit into it all? And his satisfaction in seeing the successful perpetuation of the names that meant most to him had waned, as he realized his own name would stretch forever down the margin ... an unnatural root that would outreach even the farthest leaves, no matter how it grew.

That day, he sent a copy of the pertinent family tree to any interested members and deleted all his files. He then sat down on the balcony of his cramped one-bedroom, sixth-floor apartment with a glass and a bottle of whiskey, and watched the ants’ march of cars and pedestrians crowding the street below until the sun had long been replaced by neon and LEDs.

 _With enough generations, all of these people could have a little bit of everyone you care about in them,_ he had tried to reassure himself.

As he shook the last drop onto his tongue, he couldn’t help thinking also, _one cannot live on just a taste of water at a time, even if there’s an ocean’s worth around them._

**Author's Note:**

> LOL what is timelines??
> 
> I had the mother of all trouble keeping up with who was when at any point. First it was remote controls and smartphones - then I realized Newt's time was mostly before the 2000's (though considering wizarding lifespans, I'm sure Newt's still kicking around after that). So then it became calculators, except I originally had a line about Alister in partnership with a Weasley cuz half that family was so into muggle gadgetry, except then I remembered that even in the time the original HP series was set, they were still fiddling with connecting simple electronics and it was all very omg to the rest of wizarding Britain. And then I had described the baby as red-faced in the photograph, cuz I thought COLOR! \o/ except then I panicked wondering if they had color photography yet, so I changed that, and then actually did my research and oh, they actually might have had commercial color photography by then depending on how much cash you had to fork over, and so back the color went in again.
> 
> History is hard. :( Even made-up history.


End file.
